092714-SamiAcenia
GT: Acenia walks up to Sami with a large book in her hands. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Hi Colonel Heston! Er... Sami!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: Acenia walks up to Sami with a large book in her hands. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Hi Colonel Heston! Er... Sami!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Oh, god, yeah, please don't call me 'Colonel' Heston. Colonel Heston is my father." AA: "I may be Darmok's mom, but I'm not THAT ol--actually, I think I might be YOUNGER than some of you." AA: Sami shrugs. "Weird time shit." GT: Acenia nods. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "So how's it going, Ace?" GT: "Actually, uhm... I was thinking about trying to get in contact with all the parents. I want to make a complete list of everyone the game has to offer." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Oh! That's a good idea. Yeah, you totally should. Here, let me write down everyone's handle for you." AA: Sami tears a page out of her sketchbook and writes down a list of names and handles. Her handwriting uses big, jolly curves in all the glyphs. GT: "Oh wow!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "That's only the people from the pre-scratch who are still alive of course. And also Beau, who's technically not alive, and can't leave the ark. But he's still smart and experienced at the game, so he might be worth talking to. Especially because I imagine he gets lonely up there." AA: "Oh, wait....Kate changed hers. Hang on." Sami takes the paper back, scratches something out, then writes down a new handle next to Kate's. AA: (( At least, I'm pretty sure MC said by now we would all know Kate's new one. )) GT: (( yeah )) GT: "Oh wow! Thank you Sami, I don't really know what to say!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "It's no problem. We're all in this together." AA: "And we've got to work as a team if we're going to survive this." AA: "Hey, you said you were making a complete list, right? Does that include of the post-scratch players?" GT: "Yes. I have all their handles if you want! Tethys was actually keeping good track of it, but I thought I would help out." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: Acenia pulls a document up on her YLIP and hands it to Sami. (( https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pAxQ-LptQZ06br2P40K4ABD9PooFNLTVFIpOfllT6WY/edit# )) Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Oh! Actually, yeah. I was kind of wanting to see if I could talk to Jack. I mean....my son Jack. Man, I've got to find a better way of differentiating." AA: "Maybe he's got a nickname. Or maybe I could GIVE him a nick name..." GT: "I heard our Sami call him JackJack." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Jackjack?" Sami's eyes dance with glee. "That's MUCH better. Okay, he's Jackjack from now on." AA: Sami reads through the document. "What's this about parents acting weird?" AA: "Is that just Balish?" GT: "Mostly... Though everyone was really skeptical when we got to the base. All our parents seemed to have some knowledge of what was going to happen..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Heh. Dean's daughter is named 'Mari?' I would've expected Leon to be the one....I guess she's Leon's kid too though, looking at this..." GT: "So it was a rough ti-... It's STILL kind of a rough time for all of us." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Really? All of them?" GT: "Yeah! Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Huh. I wonder how they found that out." AA: "I mean obviously Libby and Scarlet seemed to have been in contact with some of them..." AA: "...but all twenty? That seems unlikely." GT: "That's my understanding of it. That all the parents knew and it was a matter of time. That's why some of us lived the way we did." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Huh. I guess they DID had five years to talk to the parents....and the parents might have had even longer than that, depending." GT: "They'd built an entire base we were all put into. There was undoubtedly a large amount of money put into the project." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Huh. I guess it's lucky that two of us ended up planet-wide royalty in this universe." GT: "Kinda!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "That doesn't mean anything much I guess since... those planets aren't around anymore, right?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "No, but it gave them access to the money and power they would need to do this sort of thing." AA: "And I mean, sure, Maenam never seemed to care about it much, but it's still kind of cool that she's a princess." GT: "You mean the Condesce? She's Laynne Bryant in our world." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I meant the Maenam who arrived with me." AA: "Wait, Lane Bryant? Like the clothing store?" GT: "Noooo, that's the human world knock-off. Laynne Bryant is the original!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: Sami gives a confused face but decides not to argue. "I guess Maenam became a serious fashionista on this side then, huh?" GT: "The base is covered with her textiles! You will see soon enough!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Are her designs, um..." Sami struggles for a good word. "...avant garde?" AA: "Like Maenam's are?" GT: "avant..." Acenia tilts her head, "Oh! They're very geometic, typically, and feature a wide variety of contrasting color! They're definitely a sight!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: She's smiling! Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Merrow wears her clothing! Maybe you'll meet him and you can see it before we get to base?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Oh." Sami's wearing the expression one would wear when having just taken a bite of disgusting food that someone else cooked for you that you now feel obligated to compliment. AA: "If her fashion sense is anything like Maenam's, I'm sure it's the sort of thing that lesser designers would never even DREAM of trying." AA: She continues to wear a forced smile on her face. GT: "They are very bold designs." She nods. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: Sami tries to change the subject. "Oh, wait. This thing says that Merrow's Maenam's son, right? And he's your sweetheart....so I guess you're kind of a princess, too!" GT: "Some sort of future empress! I've been told!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Well I hope you're going to be a nice empress. Not the kind who stops people from having the freedom to live their lives the way they want." Sami rubs the back of her neck and looks away. "It sucks to have your free will taken away." GT: "Your Universe sounds awful if that's something you've experienced." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: She sighs. "It wasn't *my* Universe." GT: "Was it this one?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "That's not okay..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I think it's more Paradox Space in general than any particular universe." GT: "Where is that?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "And does it change when you leave it?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "What, Paradox Space? It's....everything, I guess. It's the sea of nothingness that all the universe float in, I guess." GT: "Oh, so you... can't leave it?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "And I guess the universes themselves are part of it too." AA: "I don't know. I've never thought about it. I don't know if it has an edge to go past." AA: "I guess maybe that's what happens when Rilset Voids something out of existence, though." AA: "It stops being in Paradox Space altogether." AA: "Unlike say, death, which seems to just send your ghost to a dreambubble somewhere." GT: "Would you mind if I asked you some questions, Sami?" Acenia opens her book, tucking the paper Sami gave her in the front. She flips a few pages and then looks up expectantly. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Sure. Go ahead." GT: "You said your title was Witch of Breath, right?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah." GT: "Okay, and I think you said it means you control things like Air and Breath, right?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. Literal Breath, but also symbolic breath." GT: "Okay." She scribbles in her book. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "And did your game give you lands like we have?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. Mine is the Land of Gallows and Torches." GT: "Eeeh, that sounds about as sad as mine..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "We actually brought them with us on the ark. Ryspor shrunk them down and we have them sitting in there." AA: "Yeah....it's weird. All the Witches I've seen seem so bubbly, but their lands are all either melancholy or actively hostile." GT: "Mine is Grave and Gospel..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Or at least outwardly bubbly. I have no idea what the real Scarlet is like." AA: Sami nods. "Yeah, that sounds about right." GT: "Well... Maybe we'll know what to do this time?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Did you have sprites then, too?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. The Colonel--my father--accidentally prototyped himself before I entered. I was so scared I almost shut down." AA: "Later on I tossed in what I now think might have been some of Scarlet's companion stims to bring him to the second tier." GT: "Oh! I think we all have second-tier sprites already then..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "The instruction video told us to do it a certain way!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "He got really....um....flashy. And I don't think he's worn a shirt since. At the time I thought it was the most embarrassing thing I would ever live through." AA: "Yeah. You prototype sprites twice before they can talk to you and give you advice." AA: "Although I think they're limited in the sort of advice they can give by some sort of game program. Like they're REQUIRED to be cagey about their answers." AA: "But their whole purpose is to be your primary advisor, tell you about your World Quest, tell you how to fulfill your role, all that sort of thing." GT: "Can you do more than that? I didn't give mine anything that would let it talk..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: She pokes the flower-crown on her hat. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Huh. I don't know. I never thought about it. And never tried it." AA: "You can de-prototype them though. It takes this really rare thing called a Shenanicite to do it though. And that might be one of the least interesting ways to use Shenanicite." GT: "Oh... Wait, that sounds familiar..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Oh, wait, you're Scarlet's daughter, right? Yeah, she got ahold of some Shenanicite recently." Sami purses her lips as though remembering something offensive. GT: "Yeah. Is it bad?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "The Shenanicite? Um....potentially. But not necessarily." AA: "It's really powerful. It seems to let you ignore the rules of the game when you use it." AA: "Or maybe even the laws of physics. I don't know if we've fully explored everything it's capable of." GT: "Huh..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "But like several of us used it to jump our Aspect skills to +5 without having to finish climbing our Echeladders." GT: "That sounds useful! But also lazy..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. I had not intended to do it that way, myself." Sami looks a little irritated when she says this. GT: "I suppose it can't be helped!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah....when most of us did it, we were fighting Jack. We had to do it just to survive." GT: "We've already lost one person. If we have to cheat to live, it's good enough!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "You lost somebody already?!" Sami looks crestfallen. AA: "No wonder Libby thought we needed to hurry up and get here." She sighs. "Who was it?" GT: "Eric! He's on Merrow's world though." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Eric. Eric..." she looks it up on the list Acenia showed her. "Oh, Kate's son. Poor Kate. I feel like I should reach out to her..." then Sami's jaw tightens. "...no, nevermind. She'd probably rather deal with it by herself." GT: "Or... uhm. The one he's on right now." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "You have someone stubborn too?" Acenia raises an eyebrow. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: Sami sighs. "I don't know. I didn't think so. I thought we were pretty close! But then she got upset about being rejected romantically and didn't talk to anyone for three years. Ten years from her perspective." AA: "So I think maybe she's yet another friend I've pushed away." AA: Sami shrugs. "I feel bad for her. But I probably wouldn't be able to help her feel much better about it." GT: "I know that feeling kinda. Without the sweeps of time to let the wound fester..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "You're a nice girl, Ace." She smiles at her. Then her smile fades. "Don't let that get you into trouble." GT: "Too late!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Aww. What happened?" GT: "Everytime I try to do something nice for everyone, Lily gets upset about it and thinks it's stupid." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Or one time everyone didn't really understand, but they also didn't really know." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Anyway, it seems like the greater-good doesn't work out!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Hmm. I hope it does. It's my only hope that I'm still one of the good guys." GT: "We're all the good guys in our head. Even the bad guys." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. That's what I'm afraid of." GT: "Did you all do Prospit and Derse too?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Maybe that tells us who is good and bad.... Except I'm not with Merrow..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "For a while. My dreamself got kidnapped by Jack pretty early on and....uh..." she goes a little pale. Impressive in someone who's already paper white. "...well, I didn't do Derse stuff anymore after that." GT: "Lily was telling me there was another Jack too." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Oh, yeah. This wasn't Jackjack. It was Jack the Twink." GT: "I didn't think there were any male twinks left..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "He was some sort of serial killer who was in love with Scarlet and never got over it." GT: "What?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Well there aren't. We killed him, to rescue Libby." AA: "I think he was like the King of the Twinks more or less, actually." GT: Acenia fail to respond for a while, jaw hanging open in disbelief. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Of course his ghost is still on the ark. Makes me worried to imagine Beau up there with only Libby and Scarlet and Jack." AA: "And the Herald is probably up there somewhere, too, knowing our luck. I doubt we've seen the last of him." GT: "But... The YLIP said there was only 4..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. Scarlet, Libby, Jack and Herald." GT: "Not... Lily and I?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Oh. Well....things are complicated there." AA: "Libby and Jack were technically the only ones alive when our session started." AA: "Scarlet died zillions of years ago, during their session. But Jack programmed her into the game I guess becuase of that creepy crush he had on her." GT: "Wh... " Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "She talked my friend Aura--she was a Thief of Life--into helping her come back to life, because she was like a ghost-zombie thingy on Derse. Only it turned out that what actually happened was that Aura *became* Scarlet." GT: "Wait, so my mama isn't Scarlet?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Well she is and she isn't. I imagine genetically she's identical, and she's got all the same memories and powers and even the same Classpect." AA: "Thief of Life stuff is pretty Big Time. Aura would take on parts of the things she would steal from and they would sort of become part of her." GT: "So what is an Aura?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Scarlet got her boosted up really high and had her steal from a piece of Scarlet." AA: "Aura was one of the human kids. She was the Thief of Life." AA: "I think she's as much Scarlet as anyone is. But she's not the ORIGINAL Scarlet." AA: "Luckily, Aura's dream self was still alive. So Nate managed to kiss her back to life by finding her on Prospit and kissing her." GT: "So... wh..." Acenia appears visibly upset, "I can be Scarlet too?" she squeaks. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Scarlet swore she had no idea that it was going to kill Aura when she did it." AA: "Huh? What do you mean? How would you be Scarlet too?" AA: "What's wrong, Acenia? You look shaken." GT: "Is everyone Scarlet?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Is Scarlet just a title?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "No. Scarlet was a girl from Arena, just like Libby." AA: "Look, you know how I told you about what happened to Beau?" GT: "N... Ghost?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Well yeah, but a Ghost from another Timeline. Still Beau, but not the same Beau." GT: Acenia starts rumpling up the edge of her dress. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Think of Scarlet like that. She's still Scarlet, but a different version of Scarlet." AA: "I'm sorry, Acenia. I didn't realize this would upset you so much." GT: "It Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: is just... very confusing?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. I'm sorry. I guess I've gotten used to how fucked everything is in SBURB and forgot how much it must be to take all this in." AA: She pats Acenia on the back. "Don't worry too much. Scarlet is Scarlet. It's just that she used to be dead." GT: "Okay... " Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "The Herald is sort of the same situation. The first Herald died in that same session. But he got into the SBURB code somehow. Apparently Jack kept writing him OUT of the code, actually, but he kept creeping back in." AA: She smiles sadistically. "I take it as proof that Jack wasn't as smart as he thought he was." AA: "Libby didn't seem to count Scarlet or the Herald as really alive, even though the Herald isn't a ghost. I'm not sure if she still counts Scarlet as 'not really alive' or not." AA: "She saw it as just her and Jack at first." AA: "I guess maybe now it's just her and Scarlet. Except with you and Lily, that would make four." GT: "See, this bothers me..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Because I thought alll the Male Twinks were gone..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Nope. Jack's ghost is dicking around on the ark, and the Herald is wandering Paradox Space looking for 'Injustice' to right." GT: "I need to go... rewrite something..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Wait!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "No, I don't. My Primer is Solid! It can't be anyone except Merrow!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Or so he says. Somehow I imagine his idea of 'justice' is going to be pretty fucked up when we actually see it." AA: "Why not?" GT: "Because nobody else is an emperor, and nobody else is also a prince of time. And many other things!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: Sami shrugs. "Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, I guess the High Programmer is as close to an Emperor as the Twinks had, but Jack was a Thief of Time, not a Prince." AA: "...although he was also a Lord of Doom, because he's a cheater." GT: "Well. I think they have to ask me for my primer for it to be valid. So it's okay!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. In that case I would suggest staying away from the ark. He can't leave it while he's a ghost." Sami sighs. "Not that I expect he's not going to find some way around that. Like I said, the guy's a cheater." AA: "...and come to think of it, he was completely obsessed with your mom. Thought 'she should have been his.' From what I've talked about with Libby." AA: She frets at her lower lip. "I don't know, Ace. I don't like the whole Primer thing at all, specifically because assholes like Jack can probably rules lawyer their way around most of it." GT: "I was told it's worse not to have one..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Maybe so, with Twinks." She sighs. "Not to insult your heritage, but Twink society seems all sorts of fucked up to me." GT: "I've been trying to get the hang of it..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "It's not easy." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I'll bet." AA: "I don't know. I would never depend on Jack not being able to find a way around any rule or loophole you care to come up with. But, the other thing is..." Sami looks worried. GT: "Dead people can't fill primers, right? Let's just keep him dead?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah, wouldn't that be great?" She sighs. "We've been fucked over by Jack too many times. I think all of us suspect he's going to find a way back eventually." AA: "If he does come back, hopefully the pre-scratchers can fight him off again. We've killed him before. And that was with only some of us. If we have Meouet and Nate and Ryspor this time..." AA: "Although we wouldn't have Beau." GT: "I'm going to ask the YLIP if you can kill a partner, just in case." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "...yeah. You can." Sami looks concerned. AA: "Jack did it to Libby." GT: "How many times do you people Die!?!?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: Sami sighs. "Everyone gets one extra life in the form of their dreamself. After that, you're dead for good. Unless you die on a quest bed. Then you God Tier." AA: "God Tiers always come back when they die unless their death was Just or Heroic." GT: "Do they know that about Eric?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "What, the dreamself revival? I don't know. I assumed they had already kissed him back to life if he was 'dead.'" AA: "Do you mean they didn't?" GT: "I didn't know we could kiss people to bring them back!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Only if their dreamself is alive. They'll wake up as their dreamselves." AA: "Or if you die in the dream, you kiss them and they wake up as their awakeselves." AA: "All of us in the pre-scratch have died at least once. Everyone but Seriad has died at least twice. GT: "That's... " Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "This is terrifying..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. It sucks pretty hardcore. You know, in our universe we thought this was just a video game when we started playing, too." AA: "None of this base stuff or anything. It was just a few friends playing a video game together." AA: "Never even met one another in person." AA: "Or at least I hadn't. I don't know if any of the others had." GT: "You think they'd collect like... trained professionals." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: Sami shakes her head. "No, based on what I've seen, reading Erzedbet's books about the Horrorterrors and all, it's always adolescents." AA: "People right on the cusp of adulthood." GT: "So the game wants potential?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I don't know. Maybe. Or maybe it just wants to find people who are going to be most unprepared for all the shit it's going to throw at them." GT: "That's cruel..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. SBURB is pretty frickin' cruel, from what I've seen. That's why you've got to be on guard against when it's going to try to screw you. Last time I died, it was because I tried to make friends with a lonely guy trapped in a river. After we started hitting it off, he started trying to drown me." GT: "Trust nothing, got it..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Oh! Out of curiousity, do you think you can help me train a puppy?" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Yeah. Sorry. I hate to give that advice to anyone, but it seems to be what the game's taught me." AA: Sami cocks her head. "I can try. I don't have a lot of experience with training puppies though." GT: "Maybe its not a good idea then. It's okay!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I'm more than willing to help if you just want an extra pair of hands though! Or someone to....I don't know, throw smells at them? That's a dog's primary sense, right?" GT: "Only if you PROMISE not to tell why!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Actually..." Sami thinks about it. "It's possible I can manipulate their instincts, too. It might be one of the darker sides of the Breath aspect though." AA: Sami chuckles. "What's one more secret?" she says with a shrug. GT: "I kinda wanted to make Lily a seeing-eye dog so she should stpp using all of us. Also, because then the other dogs will see we're not so bad. Cause they're scared of Slim Pickins! But... Maybe it's just books that say respect and love are more powerful than fear, you know? Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I still want to believe respect and love will win the day. No matter what past experience has told me." AA: "So let's give it a go." GT: "Just don't tell!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I won't. I've gotten pretty good at keeping secrets, thanks to....certain situations. Anyway, this is for a nice surprise for Lily, so that's different from keeping something secret for personal gain." GT: "Well, I'm going to say its from Erisio. Maybe also you. She won't accept a gift from me." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "And I still want to practice trying a void barrier, just in case." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "Oh." Sami looks sad. "But if she did it might help to mend some fences!" GT: Acenia shakes her head. Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I know not everyone is meant to be friends, but you two should at least be able to trust each other as teammates!" GT: "Nope! Much more powerful a realization if it comes later, after she's already accepted it!" Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: Sami sighs. "Okay. If that's how you want to play it." AA: "It's nice of you to do this for her though. Especially if you two don't usually get along." GT: "Maybe. The other option was to uh... well it was messier! And probably wouldn't have worked." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "I'll bet this way's going to be pretty messy too. Especially if this little guy's not housebroken yet." GT: "This house doesn't smell like..." Acenia thinks... Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ GT: "Oh boy..." Ѽ⋆:・ﾟ✧ AA: "It's okay though. I'm sure we can figure it out." GT: "I think puppies like positive reinforcement?" GT: "Probably..." AA: "Sounds good to me! Does the puppy have a name yet?" GT: "I haven't asked it..." GT: "I'm trying to keep it from waking up for a while..." AA: "Oh, okay. Well anything else you wanted to ask me about while it's sleeping?" GT: "Ah... let me see..." She consults her book again. GT: "Oh! So you prospit and derse, right?" GT: you had* AA: "Yeah. That's where I first met Scarlet, actually. She was trapped on Derse because she couldn't leave her crypt." GT: "So you were a Derse person?" AA: "Yeah." GT: "I'm on Derse! Sometimes, I don't always dream about it." AA: "It's been a long time since I dreamt of Derse." Sami looks tense, as though remembering something upsetting. AA: "I don't dream at all anymore. Or if I do, I don't remember my dreams." GT: "Oh wow... " AA: "Yeah. It's kind of a relief though, after the dreams I was having up until then." She shrugs. GT: "Ah! Well... let's see... And I think you told me your strife specibus was a paintbrush?" AA: "Yeah. I haven't really used my strife specibus at all since the first world I was on though. Especially since I've been stuck with my starter brush." GT: "Oh! Should we make another one for you?" AA: "I appreciate the offer, but at this point I do almost everything I would need with either Breath or my eldritch painting. Unless I can figure out a way to use one to do my magic." She shrugs again. GT: (( wonders if she can void smiledog )) GT: "Okay! Hmmm. What about your modus?" AA: "Pictionary Modus. It's fun, but a little more work than is probably really necessary." GT: "It sounds fun though!" AA: "Yeah, pretty fun. But if you don't draw well enough it makes these useless ghost image thingies of whatever it THINKS you drew." AA: "Just this captchacard that doesn't even have an item on it." GT: "That is not the modus for me. It takes me forever to even draw a seal..." AA: "Seals aren't that hard! You just have to really sell it with the whiskers." GT: "Huh? Oh! No, like magic seals!" AA: "Seals can do magic?" AA: Sami thinks for a moment, then realizes what Acenia means. "Oh, you mean like how you do your magic!" GT: "Uhm..." Acenia pulls one out of her modus, it's a hand-drawn magic circle on parchment. AA: "Right, okay, that kind of seal." GT: "Uh, and then I guess I need to know quadrants... Just in case we have to break and reform teams at some point! Can't have kismesis making trouble." AA: "Oh. Well I'm human, so I don't really have any quadrants. Just a boyfriend." GT: "So it's the Beau you were telling me about?" AA: "I was almost moirails with Null once, but that was a special situation. And I don't know if I would've really worked as a moirail anyway." AA: "Yeah, Beau." GT: Acenia nods and scribbles in her notebook. GT: "Do you know anything else that would be helpful for team-building?" AA: "Hmmm..." Sami thinks about it for a second. AA: "I guess....I'm one of the only people in the game who has any real hope of dealing with Horrorterrors if we run across any. I wouldn't have thought that was relevant to the game, since they seem to be outside it, but then my denizen turned out to be one." GT: "Denizen?" AA: "Yeah, you know. The bosses of each world." GT: "Bosses?" GT: "Was Slim Pickins a boss?" AA: "Could be. All the ones I've run across seemed to be tied to mythological figures though. Like Hephaestus for Kate on LOTAC, Cocytus for me on LOGAT, Cetus for Beau on LOAAF. GT: "Huh. I wonder what mythological figure would make sense for a land of Charlatans..." AA: "But maybe your session's different. You got different worlds than we did, and I think the worlds exist outside the sessions....maybe the Denizens do, too." AA: Sami thinks about it for a moment. "In fact, I'm almost certain they do I guess. Because Cocytus was on LOGAT long before the session started, and made it sound like he had been through other sessions." AA: "Not even counting his own session." GT: "So our lands aren GT: 't special to us?" AA: "I think maybe they're SPECIAL to us, but they're not MADE for us. Like maybe there are zillions of worlds and the game finds the one that's right for you." GT: "Ohh. So they get recycled based on need. How old is this game anyway?" AA: "Way old. Libby's session probably wasn't the first, and she's been around billions upon billions of years." GT: "I'm not sure if I like this..." AA: "Which part?" GT: "The whole game. It sounds pretty scary and all predestined..." AA: Sami sighs. "Yeah. Pretty much. Freedom seems to be in short supply. You might want to talk to Kate about it though. She seems really laid back about the whole stable time loop thing. Personally I kind of hate losing my free will." She closes her eyes as if thinking of something painful. AA: "If it makes you feel any better, at least the game itself lets us feel like we're making our own choices. Whether we are or not is a matter of philosophy." GT: "So we don't really make our own choices..." AA: "I don't know if we do or not." AA: "But it feels like we do." GT: "What if I just didn't do anything...?" AA: Sami mumbles. "...most of the time." AA: "Well....philosophically speaking, if everything we do is predestined and you decide not to do anything, then you were always going to make that choice I guess?" AA: "I don't really like thinking that way though. It gets too circular." GT: Acenia sighs. AA: "Sorry. I'm actually trying to be reassuring this time! But sometimes things about this game are kind of daunting. Or outright depressing." GT: "It seems like it!" GT: "It's okay, we just have to... change how we think, right?" AA: "Yeah. If there's one good thing that can be said about this game, I think it really is supposed to make us grow as people." AA: "I don't know if it always makes us grow into good people, but I think it makes us grow into....people people, I guess." GT: "Hmmm. Okay. Thanks Sami. " AA: "Sure." GT: "I'm going to go message some others, so I'll get back in touch shortly!" AA: "Okay. Good luck."